I stood there and lied. I was eleven.

Hi Reader,

It was the mid-70's. I was eleven or twelve, standing in the kitchen, holding the phone.

On the other end of the line was a stranger asking for my parents, a creditor. I didn't fully understand what that word meant yet, but I knew the script. My mother and stepfather had explicitly laid down the rules for me to obey.

"Good morning/afternoon/evening. Suchnsuch residence. May I ask who's calling?"

And when I heard the creditor's name, I faced a deeply unpleasant choice. I could comply with my parents' directive or tell the truth.

So I said it. I looked right at my mother and stepfather, who were watching me, and told the person on the phone they weren't home.

I can still feel it in my body. The tightness in my stomach and throat. The intense discomfort of being forced to say something that wasn't true as a way of proving my worth and obedience. The sense that money was something shameful — something you had to lie about or people would get hurt.

If I told the truth to the stranger on the phone, I risked getting the belt, and my mother and stepfather would have to face the embarrassment and shame of talking to the creditor.

If I lied to the stranger on the phone, I was a good girl, and they avoided an unpleasant conversation.

That moment didn't just happen to me. It distorted me. It became one of the earliest chapters in what I now call my Money Story — a story in which money was the villain. Something contemptible. Something that brought pain. Something to avoid.

And over a lifetime, that pain and avoidance cost me dearly.

I'm sharing this with you because my story is not unusual. The details are mine, but the feeling? That mix of shame, confusion, and quiet dread around money? I've heard some version of it from nearly every person I've known or worked with.

Here's what took me decades to understand: money was never actually the villain. It was a messenger. And the message it was delivering — about my worth, about what I believed I deserved, about the stories I'd inherited without ever choosing them — that message was showing me the way back home to myself. It was lighting a path that would bring me heart to heart with my unhealed hurts and metaphorical splinters.

You see, I fell in love with a source of wisdom long ago, traditional folklore. In these stories, the villain is never purely and solely bad. Instead, they are always the catalyst for transformation. Living as a professional traditional storyteller for nearly 3 decades let me spend a lot of time with these trickster figures. For example, in the powerful and haunting folktale, The Handless Maiden, the grim stranger was absolutely essential for her transformation and liberation. My question became, could money play the same role in ordinary reality?

Could it be true that money was a messenger in the service of transformation rather than a villain? If so, what was the message, and how did it support my empowerment and liberation? This was the beginning of a new chapter in my Money Story—one in which I became a seeker, not a victim.

Another powerful turning point came 5 years ago when I discovered my Human Design. I learned that, as a Projector, I'm not here to force myself to have energy to work and meet the demands of others. I also learned that I have an undefined Heart Center, which means my sense of worth does not come from proving myself through activity, accumulation, or achievement. Suddenly, a lifetime of struggle made sense — not as evidence that something was wrong with me, but as a reflection of a design I hadn't understood yet.

Now, I've created something I wish I'd had a long time ago. It combines what I've learned about money as a messenger and Human Design as the mirror that reveals the message.

I'm not quite ready to share it yet, but I wanted you to know it's coming. And I wanted to start here — with the truth. Because that's where the real wealth begins.

With heart,

Zette

P.S. If this landed somewhere in you, I’d love to hear about it. Just hit reply. I read everything.

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